As many of you know, I spent seven weeks of this summer overseas on an extended mission trip. The elders of the Summit sent my family and me to go live with some of our church planters—first in South Africa, and then in Central Asia. Our goal, in the short run, was for our family to lift up the arms of our missionaries. Our goal, in the long run, was to refresh and renew my passion for missions, which would, in turn, catalyze the Summit to reach our goal of planting 1,000 churches in our generation. We want the Greear family to be an example of how all of the Summit should be partnering with our missionaries.
If you’re at the Summit, you’ll be sure to hear stories about this trip in the weeks (months? years?) to come. But by way of initial reflection, I wanted to share a few of my initial thoughts about the trip.
1. It was a time of active rest.
Rest certainly wasn’t a given. My idea of “relaxation,” after all, doesn’t usually entail herding my four children through several foreign countries. But I return to the United States and to Raleigh-Durham refreshed.
Don’t get me wrong: I wasn’t actually relaxing much during my trip. In fact, it was often physically grueling and exhausting. Spending a week in the African bush was every bit as tough as you might imagine. The food we ate didn’t always look how I expected “food” to look. The absence of everyday conveniences was uncomfortable. But in spite of these challenges (all of which were relatively minor), it truly was a restful time.
I’ve heard it said that one of the best ways to rest is to get really tired doing something you don’t normally do. We don’t rest simply by sitting idle, though we need that at times. We rest by getting really busy with something that isn’t our usual work. And during our time overseas, we got really busy. It was as busy and restful a season as I can remember.
2. It was a joy to get back on the front lines.
When God called me to be a pastor, he did so by first calling me to the mission field. I spent the first two years of my ministry as a church planter among Muslims overseas. God never relinquished that call to missions; he showed me that my role in it is to be a part of a church that sends and supplies the mission field in extravagant ways.
Even though my primary role in the Great Commission is now as an equipper, it was such a joy to get back on the front lines. Sure, it was frustrating not being able to speak the language. But I shared Christ more, person to person, in a two-week span than I probably did the entire rest of the year here in the States. It was my identity there, the entire reason I had gone. So when an opportunity came up, I simply shared the gospel. I wasn’t “Pastor J.D.” there. I was just “J.D. the guy talking about Jesus.” I want that to last: I want to just be the “Jesus guy” even here.
3. I dream of sending more long-term missionaries.
At the Summit, we aren’t opposed to short-term trips. They fulfill a key role, and are often the training ground through which our long-term missionaries begin. But I was struck by how much impact a family can have simply by planting themselves in one place for years on end. The missionary families we’ve sent to South Africa and Central Asia have been there for years, and it seems that they are just now starting to hit their stride.
One of our directional elders, Scott Hildreth, compares this to paying for a house. You only start to get value after you’ve done it for a while. The first few years you are essentially paying down interest. It’s after year 5 that you start to make a dent in your principal. That’s how the first years of a missionary are. In the first few years, you’re learning language, getting accustomed to the culture, making some key mistakes. But with every year there, your effectiveness increases.
We have a lot of people on the field. But I want to see a lot more people like that on the field. I want to see us sending out families who are in it for the long haul.
4. Scripture memory is incredibly valuable.
This isn’t strictly related to being in another country, but it was a personal takeaway that made a big impact on me. One of our missionaries in Central Asia challenged my kids to memorize Psalms 146–150. He promised to pay them $50 if they did it. And my older two daughters took him up on it.
(He later told me that he had made the challenge to people dozens of times before, but my kids were the only ones to follow through. I told him not to be too impressed, because he didn’t take into account how much my daughters love money.)
Not to be upstaged, I decided to memorize those chapters with my daughters. And it reminded me of the incredible value of Scripture memory. This was nothing new, of course. But in a fresh way, once again, I saw how critical it is to have the words of Scripture bouncing around in your head all day long.
5. The Summit was led incredibly well in my absence.
The Summit Church isn’t all about J.D. Greear. And taking myself out of the picture for a brief spell helped reinforce that. The speakers we invited to preach on the weekends—many of them our own elders—ensured that every week was a win. And in the midst of some intense racial strife, we saw many of our elders and other leaders step up.
It’s said that “nature abhors a vacuum.” So when there’s a vacuum in leadership, something immediately fills that void. Over this summer, many of the people of the Summit rose to that occasion and showed incredible leadership. (I considered naming them here, but I would certainly leave out someone crucial…so it’ll have to stay anonymous for now.) Seeing how God used the leaders of the Summit while I was away encouraged me, though it didn’t surprise me, as I think of the Summit’s future.
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